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I walk the streets of the city. I’m traveling, yet I’m stationed within a foreign land, one I’ve become accustomed to for the last three months. Above me, in usual winter fashion, the sky is gray, dark with threatening rain. But the people are out, for it’s after noon as the weekend begins. Here, after the social nights of Friday, the parisien rises to find a bistrot among family and friends. Stomachs rumble with the digest of the previous evening’s soirée.

Consciously Consumed

Camron Karsten
2007-04-27 22:14:47

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The more life-force, the more awareness. With more awareness one won’t have to eat as much, let alone have the issues with health that many face today. What retains the life-force within food, within all sustenance, is the originality of it, it’s natural state.

The Clear & The Natural Life

As expected, food comes from the Earth—the largest source of physical life-force. Therefore, natural foods (organic, bio, homegrown, farmer’s market fresh) contain the most life-force. They are not sprayed with chemicals. They are not genetically modified. They are not frozen and shipped across land and sea. Instead, they are cultivated, planted, grown, picked, harvested and sold within the very air you breathe, the water you drink and the Earth’s soil you tread upon.

Thus, not only do we benefit from receiving the maximum life-force within food that provides the energy to carry out our purpose on this planet, but also our local growers are supported. And further, the soil they cultivate and the animals they raise are cared for because we’re giving back the love and nourishment our Mother Earth continuously provides. Transport across country and sea are reduced. Less oil is extracted. Fossil fuels become a decreased demand. The blood of the Earth remains within her core as we collectively begin to cure the wound of addiction, as we collectively begin to care for ourselves. And yes, we’re caring for the planet. Health and those qualities of abundance, joy and strength are cultivated throughout life.

All these factors are a part of life, a life of many different elements. Put together, these elements are home, making it all possible. Mother Earth is our home and we live upon it. We feed from it. We’re sustained by it. Therefore, we have a responsibility to care for it.

Now I’m Consciously Consumed

By eating consciously, buy visiting and shopping at the local farmer’s market or biologique/organic grocers, one retains the maximum life-force provided within food. And as a source of this life-force, life’s best potentials are released from within as we each strive for the abundance, joy and strength available to all.

With a backpack light on the shoulders carrying a jar of miel biologique, a trio of apples and a block of raw tofu, I return to the boulevard from which I first came. I find the cafés, brasseries and restaurants still full, their windows more foggy then before.

A breeze picks up, stirring the city’s debris in a lost arrangement of un-timed minuets. Stepping through the whirlwinds of man, I move over the waste of his domesticated pets, and I take out an apple. I wrap my jaws around its crisp skin and progress through the Paris I’ve come to know.

Wherever the road leads, I find the home-away-from-home. Whether Paris, Athens, Dharamsala, Bangkok, Monteverde or Bainbridge Island, home is a place where I continuously learn to care for myself and the planet Earth in which I travel upon.

Vegetarian Food Stores in Paris:

La Vie Claire
11, avenue Laumière (75019)

Naturalia
36, rue Monge
52, rue Saint-Antoine

Seva Natura
85, bis Bd de Magenta (at rue de Chatrol & rue La Fayette, Marche St Quentin)

Les Nouveaux Robinson
16, rue des Graviers (at Neuilly sur Seine 92, Métro: Pont de Neuilly)
49, rue Raspail (at Montreuil 93, Métro: Robespierre)
127, avenue Jean Baptiste Clément (at Boulogne Billancourt 92, Métro: Pont de St Cloud)

Canal Bio - Organic Shop
46, bis Quai de la Loire (75019)

Planete Bio
30, boulevard Saint-Germain (Métro: Maubert-Mutualité)

Vie Naturelle
178, avenue Daumesnil (Métro: Daumesnil)

This article was originally written for and posted on Brave New Traveler